Mary Angel

(2/2023) The magical experience of a family vacation. What could be more wonderful than escaping the daily grind with your husband and kids. Really, what could go wrong. When you go on vacation as a family everything is more special, everyone gets along so well, and everything works out just as you had planned. A family vacation is the most magical of times, or is it?

I have talked to a lot of moms, and dads for that matter, who have stories of the most amazing family vacation going awry. Whether because of a lost reservation, a rained out park day, or a teenager with a bad attitude, a vacation doesn’t always work out the way you had hoped. Recently we went on one last family vacation before the older kids start moving out in the next few years. It was well planned, and I had saved for years (mainly because it was supposed to be an anniversary trip during the pandemic). I have always loved Walt Disney World, as many of you know, so it only seemed fitting that my little Disneyphiles go with us on this once in a lifetime vacation.

My plan was that we would drive, to save a little money. I had bought all kinds of snacks and games for the car, booked an Airbnb for the trip down, and made all of our reservations for the parks and meals. We had decided we would make this the most memorable vacation ever. I had discussed ahead of time with everyone about making the best of every situation, no matter what. So, what could go wrong?

To begin with, we normally leave around 4 or 5 am for any long driving trip, but this time my husband decided we would leave at 10 pm the night before (since we now have so many drivers in the family to make for shorter shifts). I drove the first shift with my second oldest son as my co-pilot (he was awesome at 20 questions and keeping me awake). That went very well, except my husband couldn’t get comfortable enough in the back seat to fall asleep, which was integral to the plan of him being the next driver. He stepped up to the plate about 4 hours into the trip and drove for a couple hours until my oldest daughter took over with me as her co-pilot. She was our best driver during drivers’ education, and she did a marvelous job. A few more shift changes and we arrived at our Airbnb. It was beautiful and the views were magnificent! After a quick bite from DoorDash and an amazing view of the Epcot fireworks we were off to bed.

The next day began with us heading to our hotel withing the Walt Disney World property, as we always stay on property because my kids love grabbing the buses to the parks. Our first meal was at Raglan Road, which we had heard was okay, but turned out to be one of our favorite meals of the entire trip. Besides our room being as far as it could possibly be from the lobby, the first day went off without a hitch. Day two was not so uneventful, since I was trying to figure out the Disney World App and more importantly all of the lightening lane stuff. It was definitely a lot easier when they had fast-passes you could book ahead of time. After having been in the car for over 15 hours less than 2 days before, the kids were a little on edge and one of them had a less than magical moment in the World Showcase when he became overwhelmed by the amount of people and a difference of opinion with his brother. After a brief brotherly argument, we’re back on track (although I wasn’t sure they were going to truly get over it).

By the middle of the week there had been a bit of sass, a few more sibling arguments and some scheduling conflicts. If there is one thing I learned early in my love affair with all things Disney, its that you must make your dining reservations early if you are bigger than a party of four. So, when you realize there is a scheduling conflict (due to your husband wanting to change some plans) and you need to rearrange the conflicting dining reservations, you know you will need to take what you can get. So, we lost a wonderful restaurant and got an okay one. Don’t get me wrong, they are all good when you are at Disney. At the end of the week the heart-broken eldest daughter was having some emotional issues outbursts that were leading to a bit more sass than I was able to cope with. Compound this with the youngest whining about her feet hurting every two seconds, and the magic was being sucked out of the air. Then you add that every morning you have to be online to book your Lightening Lanes and Genie+ at 7:00 am and then jump on after you use one to book another, while your family members are squealing, "Did you get my ride?" and there was definitely a new level of stress that made me question what I was doing.

It was sometime in day one or two when I realized that the majority of the times a vacation goes bad it is because of expectations. I had this crazy expectation that this was going to be the most magical, once in a lifetime, perfect family vacation. That was my mistake, nothing in this world is perfect and to expect something to be is just setting myself and my family up for failure. Ultimately, my family couldn’t have cared less what restaurant they ate at or whether they got to ride a specific ride. Yes, they have their favorites and would love to experience them on this trip, but they would also love to try new things. When I accepted that no vacation was going to be perfect, I was more relaxed and fun-loving and that allowed my kids to be the same way. This obviously isn’t going to fix everything, as I have already stated nothing is going to be perfect, but setting your expectations more realistic and rolling with the punches will always make things more magical. Although, hormonal teenagers will still have meltdowns now and again, blistered feet are going to hurt no matter who you are, scheduling conflicts will happen, and you can’t please everyone all the time, you can still have a magical time with memories that will last a life time. May I just say, that is exactly what we did, when we embraced the good, the bad, and the ugly of family time. To quote a dear friend, these are my monkeys and this is my circus and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I wish you all a magical, realistic family vacation this year (whether big or small, near or far, make the best of it and enjoy every minute).

Read other articles by Mary Angel